Product Details

• Actors: Anthony Newley, Mackenzie Astin, Phil Fondacaro, Katie Barberi, Ron MacLachlan
• Directors: Rod Amateau
• Writers: Rod Amateau, Linda Palmer, John Pound
• Producers: John Strong, Linda Palmer, Michael Lloyd, Michael Rosenblatt
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono)
• Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
• DVD Release Date: July 12, 2005
• Run Time: 100 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (94 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00094ARVO
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,141 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "The Garbage Pail Kids Movie" on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

"Vile, smelly, rude, ugly" (Variety)your favorite grime bandits come to life with all thefarts, snot and vomit you can take in this hilarious cult classic full of "gross-out humor" (TheNew York Times). Based on the wildly popular and irreverent trading cards, The Garbage PailKidsÂ(r) Movie stars Mackenzie Astin ("The Facts of Life") as a perfectly nice teenagerwho discovers the Kids...to his disgust! When Dodger (Astin) accidentally releases the Kids from their magical trash can prison, all smell breaks loose. Despite their offensive personal habitsand attitude problemsDodger soon becomes fond of the Kids. But when Messy Tessie, Foul Phil, Valerie Vomit and the whole misfit crew join his fight against thuggish bullies, their efforts just might land them behind bars at the State Home for the Ugly!

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 61 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Achingly beautiful July 27, 2005

By NJ

Format:DVD

I really can't recommend this film enough to those of you who enjoy beautifully written, meticulously acted and stunningly visual films. The animatronics took my breath away as did the rewarding and at times challenging script. Valerie Vomit's own sub-plot is heart wrenching to say the least, as she struggles with her nauseous disposition only to overcome her weakness in the penultimate scene which was a real bittersweet moment of elation and regret. We follow these characters as they progress from prisoners to free citizens and I think this is the most satisfying of heroic transformations I have ever witnessed on film. Buy this movie.

22 of 28 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars I Cant Believe They Made This For Kids September 12, 2005

By E.L. Capinch

Format:DVD

I recently rented this movie from a non-franchised video rental place that specialised in hard to find films. Movies like this are often unintentionally funny. While this movie made me laugh, it also left me thinking "This was a really weird movie to market at little kids."

From one of the early shots of a kid's wiggling toes that are about to be eaten by a dwarf alligator, you know your in for a weird ride.

The plot is this: Theres a kid who hangs around an antique shop. The shop is owned by a magician who keeps the Garbage Pail Kids in his store in a garbage pail. The kid is always getting chased and beaten up by these bullies. One of the bullies is actually named "Juice." THATS HIS REAL NAME! Anyways, this kid ends up falling for this marginally attractive girl with poodle-frizz hair who is sort of Juice's kept woman. The kid uses the Garbage Pail Kids to create clothes for this girl who's also a fashion designer. Then when the clothes take off she tries to swindle him out of his rights to the clothes. With the help of the Garbage Pail Kids and a motorcycle gang, the kid wins in the end. Tangerine (the girl) apologizes but boy tells her "I just don't find you pretty anymore." Maybe its the big hair or the unitard, but it's rather hard to see her as attractive in the first place.

The weird thing is that this movie's just too out there for some 8 year old kid to watch - its not that theres any R-Rated stuff in there, but theres just this really, really creepy vibe between the lines of the story.

Not surprisingly, this movie was a colossal failure. It came out in 1987, and if my memory serves me correctly the GPK fad peaked around '86, which already sets this movie out on a bad foot.

Almost the entire movie is filmed at night or in dimly lit buildings, giving it a sort of unintended sinister vibe that goes along great with the scary looking Garbage Pail Kids.

The music is horrible - horrible in the way that some of the 80's pop music was horribly, only its a very poorly done amateur version of really bad 80's pop. Theres even an obvious bad Madonna rip-off song on the sound track.

I have to admit that some of the toilet humor was very, very funny. But after about 15 minutes of that you're just stuck with this AWFUL movie, with a really SLOW plot (the whole 3 Stooges scene is painfully slow and pointless) and you have to fight to stay seated and not turn the VCR off.

28 of 37 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Ach, it's okay if your expectations are extremely low July 11, 2005

By Inspector Gadget

Format:DVD

Films can come from many inspirations and sources. There are novels, plays, true stories, comic-books, video games and...trading cards? The woefully mis-handled Mars Attacks was based on a brilliant trading card series and it was hardly high art. A lower-lever trading card such as the Garbage Pail Kids is hardly likely to make great cinema. If this sort of thing cannot appeal to you (I have broad tastes and I'm a bit too understanding of flawed films) then don't even bother watching.

I wanted to rent this movie when I was a kid but my grandmother (who always evaluated the videos first) thought it looked quite inappropriate (I subsequently went for Rambo: First Blood Part II, which she thought was more fitting for a 7-year-old). Since it's one and only incarnation on video tape in the late-80s (theatrical prints promptly vanished) this film has been totally non-existant. Luckily (if you like this sort of thing) MGM bought the rights, found a dusty print and spruced it up to give us a brand new digital incarnation of The Garbage Pail Kids Movie. With erm...garbage like this getting a DVD release I must ask where the hell is Bigfoot and Howard the Duck?

Direcor Rodney Amateau (a rather fitting-sounding surname) could have made this an animated movie (eg Care Bears) but no, he actually had the audacity and nerve to attempt it in live action. Note how I said 'attempt' and not 'succeed'.

The animatronics are just horrible. Where is Jim Henson when you need him? So bad is the puppetry that the kids cannot even close their mouths and no one even bothered to lip-sync the dialogue. They are also disgusting beyond reason (as one who is familiar with the trading cards would expect). But after while they tend to grow on you (like an ulcer) and if you switch your brain off you might find that the film is alright.

There's nothing magical here. Even for a film packed with horrendously 80s fashion and production design there isn't even much nostalgic appeal. The Garbage Pail Kids Movie is certainly nothing like The Dark Crystal or even Ewoks: Caravan of Courage. Hell, it's even many leagues beneath Masters of the Universe. But, if curiousity takes control of you and you simply MUST own the film then go ahead. Just remember what I said about switching your brain off.

The DVD is in not bad-looking 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen (considering most prints were probably left abandoned in an old mine somewhere) with Dolby Mono sound. Extras are limited to a single trailer.